about owls and panthers and aomine's masculinity
by jarofclay42
Summary: [AoKuro, fluff] In which Aomine rummages through the stuffed toys' basket and Kuroko shows that he knows Aomine very well. (from "Imagine your OTP getting stuffed animals and naming them after each other.")


**Short fluffy fic about Aomine and Kuroko being stupid together while shopping with Kagami and Momoi.**  
**Written for andreaphobia's birthday, whose fics never fail to make me roll on the floor with glee C:**

**I thought a lot about whether to put this here, because it was far too idiotic lol, but I guess I'll just throw it in a series and put the warning 'idiotic diabetes-inducing teeth-rotting fluff'.**

**Betaed by Airway Static (sui on AO3) who once again was an awesome beta! (she writes aokuro fics too so if you love this ship as much as I do go check her out!)**

* * *

"Oh my god," Aomine says, his murmur barely rising over the noise in the crowded discount market. "Oh my god Tetsu, look. It's _you_."

When Kuroko turns around, he sincerely doesn't know what to think of Aomine's dumbfounded expression as the latter shows him a small stuffed owl with messy grey fur and blue, glassy eyes as big as nuts.

Kuroko gives him a long, blank stare that has no apparent effect on Aomine's temporary awe towards the plushy, except for maybe _increasing_ it, since Aomine brings the plushy closer to Kuroko's face for a better comparison.

"Yes," he confirms, bewildered, "same fucking eyes. So _creepy_. Are you sure you don't have some owl ancestor in your family tree?"

"I'm pretty sure, yes," Kuroko says as he casually brushes the plushy away from his face and starts rummaging through the stuffed toys' basket too, in search of some kind of revenge.

"Aaah, man," Aomine whines as he leans against the basket, fiddling with the owl plushy in his hands distractedly, "how long does it take to fetch a package of tampons? Did they get lost?"

"Maybe they're having a moment to themselves, far from you," Kuroko says before he can think better of it and Aomine's head snaps in his direction instantly, wearing an irked expression.

"What does that mean?" he asks. "I am _very_ companionable!"

"Yes, and for that Kagami-kun always gets something very close to a head-splitting migraine when you're in each other's company for over an hour," Kuroko states, still rummaging. "You can sometimes have that effect on—"

Kuroko stops abruptly when his hands come out of the large basket holding not revenge but, instead, a little, sleek-furred panther with a vaguely aggressive look in its dark blue eyes. Kuroko gazes at it, mesmerized. "Mh," he mumbles.

Aomine diverts his attention from his own plushy and shoves it in the crook of Kuroko's neck. "What?" he asks in a fake, silly voice hopefully not meant to sound like his own, Kuroko thinks, because it mostly resembles the voice of a granny. "Did you find someone who looks more like you than me? That's impossible, Kuroko-kun. I am your grandfather, boy. Look at me. Please look at _meee_."

When Kuroko turns to him and shows him the plushy, Aomine stares at it blankly. "Uhm, no," he comments reluctantly, back in his own voice.

"Not me," Kuroko elaborates, "you. Aomine-kun reminds me of a panther sometimes, especially when he plays basketball. And it has your expression."

"Huh." Predictably, Aomine smirks smugly as he throws the Kuroko-plushy in the air and catches it repeatedly. "A panther? Of course, I am just _that_ cool."

Kuroko ignores him as he contemplates the plushy. He can't stop admiring it, he finds, and he doesn't really want to put it back either, the resemblance too strong to let it go to waste in the cold, large basket of unnamed stuffed toys.

"I think I'm gonna buy it," he says in a low voice.

"What?" Aomine asks, caught off-guard. "Are you serious?"

"Yes," Kuroko replies, sending him an eloquent glance. "Is that a problem?"

"Well, yes?" Aomine croaks. "We're seventeen year old guys; there are a lot of things wrong with buying little, cute stuffed animals to keep on your bedside table."

"Are there? Well, I don't think I care enough," Kuroko mildly states. "Besides, it would be nice to have something that reminds me so much of Aomine-kun while he's not there."

Aomine halts at that and looks down at the owl in his hands intently – as if on the verge of giving him the ultimate judgment— with a small, troubled frown curving his lips. He lightly squeezes the plushy as he turns it around in his fingers and then sighs heavily. "When you say the most embarrassing stuff like that, Tetsu…" he finally says, softly, smiling at him with the attitude of a man who has resigned himself to a cruel truth already. "I guess I'd like to—"

"Sorry for the wait, Tetsu-kun! We can go now."

Aomine's hand is surprisingly fast as it snaps back and throws the stuffed animal back into the basket and probably no one in the whole market has the chance to miss the scowl Aomine sends Kagami the moment he comes back with Momoi.

"What is it now?" Kagami asks hopelessly, returning the stare with more impatience than he's ever shown that day.

"What? Nothing," Aomine bites back, his challenging glare unrelenting; Kagami just sighs deeply, giving up trying to understand him.

"Did we miss something?" Momoi asks, as she eyes the three of them hesitantly.

"No, not really," Kuroko replies, "except the part when I found this thing here and decided to buy it." He thrusts the stuffed panther forward, showing it to his friends. "Doesn't it look like Aomine-kun?"

While Kagami gives him a weird look, predictably, Momoi squeals in delight.

"Oh my, it's true!" she chirps, coming closer to get a better look. "Look at these frowning eyes! Except he's not this cute at all."

"Should I really take that as an insult?" Aomine deadpans.

"Are you going to give it a name?" Momoi inquires, blatantly ignoring her childhood friend.

"Of course. I'm gonna call it 'Daiki-kun'."

"Wait, what?" Aomine splutters indignantly. "How is it that I'm 'Aomine-kun' and this one here becomes 'Daiki-kun' only thirty seconds after you've met it?"

As Kagami chokes on vaguely suppressed laugher that earns him another glare from Aomine, Kuroko shrugs. "Because it's cute."

"Well," Kagami grins, clearly wanting to give his two cents on the issue, "I'm quite surprised. I thought you'd have enough of Aomine for one day. Are you really sure you want him there with you at home all the time?" He plops his large, heavy hand on Kuroko's head and ruffles his hair affectionately. "I guess this only confirms the truth that you're another crazy one."

"Well, I enjoy having Aomine-kun around a lot," Kuroko replies. "Could you please stop doing that," he adds flatly on second thought.

Aomine chooses that moment to slide his arm around Kuroko's shoulders and sends Kagami a smug grin. "See? He _enjoys_ me."

Kagami snorts jokingly, "Yes, what was I saying? Crazy one."

"Yeah and while you two go back to your endless banter, can we pay for this stuff?"

And it's indeed preceded by their loud blabbering that the four of them manage to make their way out of the discount market, with only a bunch of glares from the costumers and a light scolding from the cashier; and all the while, Kuroko has to watch Aomine snort and complain and be generally stupid, overtly challenging towards Kagami and being annoying toward anyone. Kuroko has to close his eyes for a moment and breathe deeply as he asks himself how Momoi managed. But he discards his exasperation quite quickly. Even this is progress, he thinks. At least now Aomine doesn't lash out at people violently or look bored out of his mind all the time anymore. Progress, indeed, and Kuroko feels like smiling a bit.

They have just walked outside, away from the doors when Momoi asks them to stop.

"Wait, wait!" she exclaims, sounding slightly embarrassed. "I'm sorry, can I go in that shop? I have to check a thing. I'll be back in a minute."

"I'll come with you," Kagami says and as Aomine and Kuroko remain alone again, Kuroko starts to suspect that what he said before to Aomine could actually be the truth.

"So," Aomine starts nonchalantly, when he sees the others enter the shop, "you really bought it. Don't you feel deeply emasculated or something like that?" It's kind of funny, Kuroko thinks, the way Aomine keeps on stealing quick glances at the discount market's doors, as if trying to resist the urge to go back in there and fix something gone wrong.

"Why does this topic unsettle you so much?" he sighs while he slips his hand in the plastic bag in search of the little ball of fur.

"This doesn't unsettle me _at all_, Tetsu," Aomine snorts off-handedly, "I'm just saying that—"

Kuroko doesn't bother to let him finish the sentence – which gets lost in the action of catching the flying object he throws at Aomine without warning – just looking forward to seeing the other's reaction when he realizes what his fingers hold.

"When did you even buy it?" Aomine asks appalled, his eyes wide open.

"When I bought mine, of course," Kuroko explains. "While you were too busy glaring at Kagami-kun to notice."

Aomine scowls at that. "I wasn't glaring at Kagami. Why would I glare at Kagami?" He stops, thinks fro a moment, and then adds, "I mean, well, there are lots of reasons to glare at Kagami, but I wasn't glaring at him _then_."

Kuroko resists the urge to slap him. "Aomine-kun, shut up and enjoy the present."

Aomine doesn't know this – Kuroko makes a point to never tell him in order to spare himself from the ashamed tirade that would ensue, because Aomine is sometimes excessively in love with his masculinity – but he's kind of very cute in Kuroko's eyes when he frowns in embarrassment.

"I would have preferred basketball shoes," Aomine complains.

"I don't have money for those right now," Kuroko replies calmly.

"So _you_ gave me this," Aomine half states, half asks, as if he's trying to come up with a satisfying version of the facts for himself as well as the world.

"Yes," Kuroko agrees.

"Because _you_ wanted me to have it."

"Kagami-kun doesn't even have to know you have it," Kuroko reminds him.

"Right," Aomine sighs, trying to hide his relief and failing, "right."

"What are you gonna call it?"

When Aomine gives him an absurdly gloating smirk as he squeezes his new plushy, testing the feel of it, Kuroko decides it was worth the pain of facing Aomine's personal issues with masculinity, Kagami and masculinity around Kagami.

"Tetsuya-kun sound good?"

Kuroko frowns slightly, perplexed. "How can you show more politeness to a stuffed animal than what you showed me thirty seconds after we met?"

Aomine shrugs his shoulders, staring at the owl critically. "I don't know. I'm afraid he will eyelaser-shoot me in the night if I don't show respect."

"I can do that too," Kuroko says flatly.

"If you're telling me you'll stay for the night in order to try to eyelaser-shoot me while I sleep, I have to say, I can take the risk."

Kuroko rocks on his heels, pensive, before adding, "I can do that tonight, actually."

Aomine's smirk could probably fire up the Antarctic and Kuroko _feels_ how that affects him straight away, his mind already filling with very specific kind of thoughts—but he still takes a moment to sigh inwardly at how predictable the strings he has to pull to put Aomine in a good mood are.

"Your place?" Aomine asks, smugly.

"My place," Kuroko agrees.

When Kagami and Momoi come back, Aomine hasn't even put the stuffed animal away, still playing with it right in front of Kagami as the latter eyes him warily. "Does it take one stuffed animal to pry his head out of his ass?"

"Nope," Aomine informs him, grinning. "That is because, unlike you, I'm gonna get laid tonight."

Kuroko offers his excuses to the hard-blushing duo hitting Aomine right under his ribcage, as fast and hard as he can. While Aomine doubles over, with his eyes tearing up under the slightly satisfied gaze of Kagami, Momoi draws near Kuroko, looking inexplicably guilty.

"Do you often give in to his nymphomaniac needs to make him happy when he's being a jerk?" she asks him worriedly, as if it was her own fault Aomine's like that.

"Sometimes, yes," Kuroko admits lightly.

"I didn't want this information in my life," Kagami whines, as he looks at Momoi shouting "What did I tell you?!" while giving her share of kicks in the shins to Aomine, who instead yelps repeatedly between his insults, uselessly trying to keep her from approaching any more, "I didn't want it."

And as Kuroko ignores them all in favor of ogling yearningly at the ice cream parlor whose flashy sign shines bright down the road in front of them, he manages to never lose sight of how Aomine keeps smiling faintly when he distractedly brushes the stuffed animal kept safe in his pocket.

* * *

**I firmly believe Kuroko can eyelaser-shoot people for real.**


End file.
